Visual arts: forms, history, and cultural significance

Man's first works of art were expressions of religious ideas. Later, painting and sculpture were mostly commissioned art for religious institutions (in Europe the church), rulers, nobles or wealthy citizens. The motifs and imagery were often subject to strict conventions in most cultures. Perspective and other techniques radically changed art. The emergence of an art that no longer served any particular purpose as an end in itself (l'art pour l'art) in turn changed the relationship between artist, society, and artwork. In part, art became a site of utopias or took over tasks of religion.

Today, professional visual art is determined by a global art market. In Western countries, public funds or art venues such as museums are also increasingly being replaced by private-sector institutions and private foundations. Discussions about the contemporary concept of art are taking place in art criticism, art theory and at art academies. Since the 1990s, the art scene, which is concentrated primarily in Europe and North America, has been increasingly expanded by emerging countries such as Brazil, South Africa, Korea, or the Gulf States, which, for example, organize their own biennials.

Africa

When one speaks of African art, one is referring to the art of black Africa, which, like the rest of African culture, is distinct from the Arab north of the continent, the states of the Maghreb, and includes the artistic production of many very different ethnic groups. The peasant structures of Africa, which mainly produced wooden sculptures, the climatic conditions and a habitat that makes it easy for termites and other pests, have left almost no historical objects of traditional African art.

Since the artistic works of the then colonized continent have only been appreciated, researched and, above all, collected as objects of authentic cultures in Europe since the beginning of the 20th century, most of the works in museums and collections inside and outside Africa as well as on the art market are, with few exceptions, not older than 150 years.

Today outdated, discriminatory-sounding terms such as primitivism, Negro sculpture (Carl Einstein) or (in France) art negre were affirmative catchwords of Classical Modernism, which took the clear forms and timeless aura of African objects as its model.

America

For pre-Columbian art, see: Aztec, Chichimec, Huaxtec, Inca, Maya, Mixtec, Olmec, Purépecha (Tarasque), Toltec, Totonak, Zapotec, Chavín, Moche, Chimu, Recuay, Paracas, Nazca, Ica-Chincha, Chancay, Lima, Taíno, Marajó, Muisca, Narino, Tairona, Calima, Tolima, Sinu, Guinea.

Asia

• On the art of the equestrian peoples, see: Alans, Avars, Xiongnu, Huns, Cimmerians, Magyars, Massagets, Mongols, Parthians, Pechenegs, Polovtsians, Saks, Sarmatians, Scythians, Tatars.
• For Khmer art, see Angkor Wat.
• Chinese Art
• Japanese Art
• Korean Art
• Parthian Art
• Persian miniature painting